‘Woof woof,’ said Red. ‘Dump and run, don’t mind me.’
Shay placed the cases on the bed and swung round. ‘The rest of his things are going into storage until the house is ready. This looks great.’ He admired the bedroom Rosa had hastily decluttered, taking in the view over the garden from the diamond-leaded windows, the blue and white curtains and matching bed linen, the paintings on the sky-blue walls, and the bijou en suite bathroom. ‘Dad, you’ve done well. Try not to get yourself kicked out.’
‘I’ll do my best.’ In the doorway, Red was recovering his breath.
‘I have to go. See you later.’ Shay grinned at Rosa. ‘Let’s hope he behaves himself. Any problems at all, let me know.’
They watched from the window as he jumped into his car and sped off. Rosa said, ‘I’ll put the kettle on, leave you to get yourself settled in.’
‘Hang on.’ Red unzipped the smaller of the two cases and took out two bottles of Prosecco. ‘Stick these in the fridge, would you? We’ll have a proper drink in a bit.’
‘OK, but I mustn’t have more than one glass. I’ve got a doll to make this evening and it wouldn’t do to amputate the wrong leg.’
By five o’clock, the second bottle was almost empty and it had been mutually agreed that there should be no doll-making tonight.
Oh, but the last couple of hours had flown by. Red was wonderful company and a natural raconteur. Up until today, most of what she’d known about him had been acquired via hearsay and gossip. But hearing his stories in his own words was proving completely fascinating. Here they were, sitting outside in the shaded part of the garden, and it was light years more fun than chopping potatoes and onions whilst half watching Come Dine With Me.
‘. . . It was the adrenalin rush that got me hooked.’ Having checked the time on the watch that hung loosely around his wrist, Red took a couple of packets of pills from his shirt pocket and washed the tablets down with water followed by a glug of Prosecco. Which probably wasn’t advisable, but he was almost sixty years old and it was his body, his decision.
‘I don’t like adrenalin rushes,’ said Rosa. ‘They make me feel sick.’
‘Oh come on, not always.’ His eyes glinted with mischief. ‘How about when you buy a two-hour parking ticket and don’t get back to your car for three hours?’
‘That would never happen, I’m telling you now.’ The very idea made her skin prickle with panic. ‘If I thought I was going to be there for three hours, I’d buy a ticket for six hours just to be on the safe side. Would have done,’ she amended, ‘back when I had a car.’
‘You see, that’s the difference between us. I’d never even buy a ticket in the first place, and the thrill would be in wondering if I was going to get caught. Best of all, heading back to the car and reaching it just before the traffic warden gets there. That’s the kind of adrenalin buzz I’m talking about.’
‘I don’t know how you can do it.’
‘Ah, I reckon it’s in the genes. When I was a kid, my parents were that way inclined too. What was your favourite TV show when you were at school?’
Rosa blinked. ‘Um, Blue Peter, I guess.’
‘You see? Mine was Robin Hood. And the Cary Grant movie, To Catch a Thief. There was also an American TV series called Alias Smith and Jones. Then when I was about eleven, my dad smuggled me into the cinema and we saw Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Everything I loved was about law-breakers, people who got a thrill out of beating the system. To me, it was glamorous and exciting and the best fun in the world. Some people get that kind of rush from . . . I don’t know, scoring a goal at Wembley or singing on stage in front of a massive audience, or riding a motorbike at a hundred miles an hour.’ He sat back and spread his palms. ‘I always got mine from getting away with something I shouldn’t have been getting away with.’
‘I can see that,’ Rosa protested. ‘But the thing is, half the time you didn’t get away with it, did you? You kept getting caught and sent back to prison, over and over again.’
He shrugged. ‘It was the risk that made it exciting. The thrill of the gamble.’
Gambling. Well, she knew all about that. Maybe this was why Red and Joe had always got on together so well; Joe might never have done anything illegal, but he’d been the ultimate entrepreneur and risk-taker. In order to build up his businesses, he’d juggled money with great success, right up until that success had – without her knowledge – disintegrated and turned to disaster.
‘Sorry.’ He raised a thin hand by way of apology, and Rosa realised she’d been staring off into space. ‘Is that the reason you had to move out of Compton House? I haven’t asked anyone what happened . . .’
She nodded. ‘It’s OK, it’s no secret. There was a problem with one of the businesses getting into trouble, and Joe did what he’d always done, borrowing from the others in order to shore it up. But this time the situation didn’t sort itself out and he found himself getting deeper and deeper into debt. He didn’t want to worry me, so he kept it to himself and worked on finding new ways to make it better . . . loans, a second mortgage . . . a few evenings in the casino. Except that didn’t go according to plan either, and the more money he lost, the more he had to gamble to try and make it back, because sooner or later it had to come good, didn’t it? He didn’t tell me any of this,’ Rosa went on. ‘A couple of his friends did, months later. And the thing is, he only did it because he loved me and wanted to protect our family. We meant the world to him.’
‘Of course you did.’
‘He was trying to get himself out of a financial hole, but the hole kept growing deeper. And I still had no idea about any of it. Then he had the heart attack, and it must have been the stress of it all that caused it to happen.’ Rosa’s throat ached at the memory but she forced herself to carry on. ‘He was about to be taken into theatre to be operated on and I think he knew he wasn’t going to make it. He kept telling me he was sorry, over and over again, but I didn’t know why. And then he died.’
‘Terrible for you.’ Red nodded in sympathy.
‘It really was. I was in a complete daze for the next couple of weeks, but it was still really bothering me, not knowing why he hadn’t been able to stop saying sorry. I mean, I always knew he loved me and it had never even occurred to me that there could have been anyone else. But I actually began to wonder if he’d been having an affair.’
‘Joe? Never.’
‘I know. I wondered if some glamorous mistress might turn up at the funeral. Anyway, that didn’t happen, and we had the service, and I was still waiting for the mistress to turn up. Then a couple of weeks later I was called in for a meeting with Joe’s accountant and his solicitor, and that was when the truth came out. That was when I discovered the mistress was actually the bank.’
‘Shit.’
‘Nearly all the money was gone. And the bank wanted our house, because it no longer belonged to us, it was their house now.’
‘I can’t imagine how awful that must have been.’ Red was reaching across, topping up her glass. ‘After everything else you’d been through.’